The new Chicago ward map garnered enough City Council votes to dodge a referendum, but some community organizations say it reflects the same old problems.

A Latino Voices, Black Voices crossover conversation on Chicago’s new ward map. A pilot program aimed at defending undocumented immigrants facing deportation. And a local rugby program back in action.

Chicago City Council members voted 43 to 7 to approve a new ward map this week. The approval came after a monthslong tug-of-war between the council’s Latino and Black Caucuses over the balance of wards. The approved map has 14 wards with a majority of Latino voters — one short of the 15 wards the Latino Caucus had demanded.

Guest conductor Karina Canellakis led the CSO in “Brio” (by Augusta Read Thomas); Robert Schumann’s lushly beautiful “Piano Concerto in A Minor” (featuring pianist Kirill Gerstein); and finally “Ein Heldenlaben (A Heroic Life),” Richard Strauss’ sweeping, fiercely emotional tone poem.

In Illinois, which lost a seat in redistricting because of its shrinking population, the state's two first-term female representatives — one Democrat, one Republican — were among the 18-member delegation's biggest losers in the state's remapping.

The Chicago Teachers Union will officially have a new leader as vice president Stacy Davis Gates defeated two other challengers to become president of the powerful labor organization.

The Chicago Police Department is beefing up police presence after a new deadly downtown shooting. Meanwhile, the mayor’s new daily curfew of 10 p.m. clears a committee and will be voted on by the full City Council next week.

Even though Lightfoot stacked a special City Council committee with her allies to consider the casino proposal, Ald. Tom Tunney (44th Ward) acknowledged Friday that the mayor did not have enough support to advance the plan to build a casino and resort.

A week after suffering the devastating loss of Monty, one half of Chicago’s beloved piping plover power couple, the city’s birding community has cause for celebration: One of Monty and Rose’s 2021 chicks has been positively ID’d on a beach in Duluth, Minnesota.  

Two people were killed and seven people were wounded in a mass shooting late Thursday blocks from Michigan Avenue amid a continuing surge in violence downtown. Mayor Lori Lightfoot called the incident “an outrageous act of violence.”

A Manhattan judge declared Trump in contempt of court on April 25 and fined him $10,000 per day for not complying with a subpoena in New York’s long-running investigation into his business practices.

The 100-year-old bakery closed at the end of April. Fans looking to own a piece of Chicago history can bid on the sign at auction June 3, with proceeds earmarked for charity.

The 14-3 vote by the Chicago City Council’s Public Safety Committee tees up a showdown over the controversial measure by the full City Council, which is set to meet twice next week on Monday and Wednesday. 

Leaders of a Tennessee abortion clinic calculated driving distances and studied passenger rail routes as they scanned the map for another place to offer services. They chose Carbondale in Illinois — a state that has easy abortion access but is surrounded by more restrictive states in the Midwest and South.

La Casita de Don Pedro is one of many parts of Humboldt Park that reminds people of the neighborhood’s deep Puerto Rican roots. Maintaining that culture is something advocates have been focused on.